Largest Ships You've Used

[HaliRyan (OP)]

You mean their salvo size won't be as large. 

But yes, I have considered that but I think the reload time trade off is not worth it.  In fact, I don't generally use 25% size launchers because they take too long (although I ought to look at using size 3 missiles to cut that some more)

No, I meant their range. Fighters will have a much shorter deployment range from their carrier than a 7000 ton ship using normal military engines will. The salvo size will be smaller as well of course, but the total ordinance launched should be roughly the same which is what really matters.

Also I'm not sure what you're talking about with 25% size launchers? Perhaps I missed something, but most people use box launchers for any ship which will be carrier-based instead of 25% reduction launchers.

[blue emu]

I'm curious, what size missiles are you using?

Size-6... they are the largest size of missile that still shows a minimal radar signature (same as size-1).

Another thought was to use big Carriers to place and recover Meson-armed Jump Point Defense Stations (all Mesons, Engineering, Armor and Shield, no Engines). They could drop them off at the jump point, and carry the older ones back for overhaul.

I'm sure this "huge Carrier carrying one big ship" idea can be used for something...

Also I'm not sure what you're talking about with 25% size launchers? Perhaps I missed something, but most people use box launchers for any ship which will be carrier-based instead of 25% reduction launchers.

I use Box Launchers, yes. 25% Launchers are somewhat more compact, but also much slower to reload.

[jseah]

My conception of the "missile platform in carrier" idea was this:

A 6kton ship with many hangar bays, engines, whatever. 
A second 'ship' inside the first 6kton ship's hangars (made to fit exactly) would have no engines or fuel, minimal maintenance, no armour or shields. 
This 2nd 'ship' is really just a box launcher missile platform.  All box launchers, a few missile firecons, crew quarters for the fire cons and that's it. 

This is meant to use the lowered space requirements of box launchers. (0.15x size + 0.05 for hangar inefficiency = 0.20x which is smaller than 0.25x reduction)
And obviously generates an incredibly huge salvo size. 

The trade off is more complex logistics (two types of shipyards and two ships to train) and increased reload times when using smaller missiles/higher tech.  Hangar reload doesn't improve with technology and with small missiles (eg. size 3), you can eventually get 25% launchers that reload as fast as hangars in which case you may as well build 6kton ships with 25% launchers. 

[HaliRyan (OP)]

I use Box Launchers, yes. 25% Launchers are somewhat more compact, but also much slower to reload.

Errr... aren't box launchers more compact than the 25% ones? It's 0.25 per missile size point for 25% and 0.15 for box isn't it?

[Girlinhat]

25% launchers are "somewhat more compact" than full sized, I believe was the intention there.  25% launchers are, as the name implies, 25% the size of a standard launcher.  Box launchers are 15% size normal.

[Brian Neumann]

You can get a lot more box launchers into a given volume of your ship.  The drawback is that you can not reload except at a planet with maintenance facilities, or in a hanger.  For larger ships if I am looking for that one shot punch I prefer the 25% size launchers.  Your rate of fire is horrendous, but that is not the point.  You get four times the salvo size of the normal sized launchers (vs 6.66 for box launchers) and you can reload in the field.  I will typically include enough magazine capacity for 1 or 2 reloads which has worked well in the past.  I launch my salvo, observe results while waiting a few hours to reload and then hit them again.  Repeat with periodic stops to reload the magazines from the colliers and continue.  To be fair I also build fleet colliers that are stripped down warships with thier engines, shields, armor and ciws systems left intact.  Pretty much everything else is magazines.  One of these is enough to reload a combat ship about 5 times which is fairly good for a front line resuply ship.

Brian

[sloanjh]

You can get a lot more box launchers into a given volume of your ship.  The drawback is that you can not reload except at a planet with maintenance facilities, or in a hanger.  For larger ships if I am looking for that one shot punch I prefer the 25% size launchers.  Your rate of fire is horrendous, but that is not the point.  You get four times the salvo size of the normal sized launchers (vs 6.66 for box launchers) and you can reload in the field.  I will typically include enough magazine capacity for 1 or 2 reloads which has worked well in the past.  I launch my salvo, observe results while waiting a few hours to reload and then hit them again.  Repeat with periodic stops to reload the magazines from the colliers and continue.  To be fair I also build fleet colliers that are stripped down warships with thier engines, shields, armor and ciws systems left intact.  Pretty much everything else is magazines.  One of these is enough to reload a combat ship about 5 times which is fairly good for a front line resuply ship.

I do similar things with my FAC - 25% launchers with 1-2 reloads.  The only trouble I have is when the enemy has powerful enough shields to absorb a large fraction of a salvo - the shields then have time to recharge between my salvos and end up costing me many more shots.

John

[Brian Neumann]

I do similar things with my FAC - 25% launchers with 1-2 reloads.  The only trouble I have is when the enemy has powerful enough shields to absorb a large fraction of a salvo - the shields then have time to recharge between my salvos and end up costing me many more shots.

John

I have found two ways to deal with this.  One is to load my size 1 launchers with a missile where I switch all of the agility for extra fuel and a .01 size passive sensor.  Fire a salvo 5-10 seconds before your main asm fire and then again with the main asm's.  The point defense missile tend to absorb a huge percentage of their point defense which leaves a lot of the heavier missiles to get through.  The second way is to have my escorts be designed with a bunch of reduced size launchers for a small asm.  Fire them 5 seconds before the primary asm swarm to do the same thing.  Either way you tend to get a lot more of your main salvo through which tends to destroy the target fairly well.

Brian

[sloanjh]

I have found two ways to deal with this.  One is to load my size 1 launchers with a missile where I switch all of the agility for extra fuel and a .01 size passive sensor.  Fire a salvo 5-10 seconds before your main asm fire and then again with the main asm's.  The point defense missile tend to absorb a huge percentage of their point defense which leaves a lot of the heavier missiles to get through.  The second way is to have my escorts be designed with a bunch of reduced size launchers for a small asm.  Fire them 5 seconds before the primary asm swarm to do the same thing.  Either way you tend to get a lot more of your main salvo through which tends to destroy the target fairly well.

My problem was more logistical than PD - I just didn't have the launchers present in-system (in my FAC wing) to be able to blow through the shields and kill the soft chewy (ok, heavily armored, actually) center.

At one point I managed to get a fighter wing in position to coordinate a time-on-target launch (including launch delay and different missile design speeds) of my size-1 asm design so that it hit just in front of the size-4 missiles coming in from the FAC.  The size-1s knocked down the shields, which let the size-4s kill the target, but this was more a raw damage thing than increased PD penetration.

What I was fighting was a monster Invader ship with many hundreds of points of shields and armor.  The cycle time on my FAC launchers was about 20 minutes, while their shield recharge was about 5 minutes.  Half (or more) of the damage from each missile strike was getting absorbed by the shields, resulting a huge logistics drain on my missile stockpiles .

John

[Girlinhat]

How do invaders react with marines?  At that point would it be feasible to microwave the shields and drop troops onboard?  After all, if you can't crack the armor you just look for another way in, right?  A high powered laser strike could even blast a hole for the marines.

Is it possible to capture an invader ship, or do they have some catch-all defense?

[sloanjh]

How do invaders react with marines?  At that point would it be feasible to microwave the shields and drop troops onboard?  After all, if you can't crack the armor you just look for another way in, right?  A high powered laser strike could even blast a hole for the marines.

Is it possible to capture an invader ship, or do they have some catch-all defense?

For those of you replying to this, please remember to place spoiler tags appropriately, or discuss in "Spoilers" forum.

John

[Vynadan]

As far as I know, the Invaders can be captured like any other ship. After all, not even the Swarm is save from that. Though with their high tech you'd need to time very well when to deploy your marines, as the shields regenerate a small amount every 5 second increments. I haven't seen any marine companies put on larger ships (which I usually do for story reasons), so I guess it should be fairly simple once you're on board. I don't know if the absorption quality of their shields somehow influences the drop, though.

[Girlinhat]

For the record, the existence of invaders and swarm and such cannot be a secret.  It's part of the checklist when you start a game, everyone who's played the game knows they exist.  They just don't know any specifics until they encounter them~

I've seen the spoiler forum posts about captured queens and matriarchs, and they tend to be terrible player ships due to the 120,000% annual failure rate.  I assume invaders suffer the same NPC-cheat style that lets them get away with this.  Still, it'd be pretty boss to manage and capture and refit an invader ship at all.  Even if you had to strip half the gear to equip new maintenance, it'd still just be fun for RP purposes alone.

[Vynadan]

Well, with Invaders you could get lucky if they open a wormhole in a system you're already established a presence in. Either maintenance capacities are already there or you can move them there so the dismantling or refitting of their ships could happen faster. I'd never refit an NPC ship personally due to the maintenance and fuel circumstances, but rather dismantle it for its technology.

[Girlinhat]

I'd probably dismantle as well, but I like the idea of catching an enemy vessel as-is, tweaking it to racial tolerances, and then flying it back against the enemy!